I am not sure what kind of discussion you were anticipating last night, but everything was talked about at legnth in the committee meetings. Last night was a formality, as every order came out of committee with a recommnedation for passage. I wasnt antipating any heated debates last night, were you?
Agreed, the structure of the meeting was completely unorganized. Not a meeting MZ wants to remember, Im sure. Highlight of the evening was the resolution recognizing the middle school students and our veteran services here in the city. SF does a good job with that.
SF voted NO on the override in 2015, which I was happy to hear about. He has walked through the 3 fire stations and the police station to witness the terrible conditions for himself, which in turn puts pressure on the city to discuss the results of the public safety building report that was completed last year.
I think SF wants to keep the fire and police building part of the conversation, and not let the school debate suck all the air out of the room. Will be interesting to see what happens in the months ahead. If there was any bright spot in this years budget talks he would be my choice.
And once again, Mr. Mroz came before the Board and once again made perfect sense. Yes, I know he can be hard to listen to sometimes - people who while speaking say "um" all the time drive me a little nuts - but his knowledge and understanding of the water and sewer system is top notch. It's clear he knows more about it than any of the Board Members, and his point last night - that keeping 10% reserves for each is ridiculous - is spot on. Those dollars should be applied now to correction of existing problems, rather than sitting there earning nothing and accomplishing nothing. Why kick the can further down the road and it costs twice as much when there are funds available to address at least some issues right now? Add to that the surcharges we get hit with and it makes even less fiscal sense. Mr. Mroz is exactly what we need right now - someone who understands the problem and is willing to shine a light on them. Who cares if he's "popular" or not, if he's right? What is this, Junior High?
The next vote will be for an override in the spring of 2019. Then the elected positions including mayor in fall of 2019 as you state.
No surprise about MZ. He’s worse than an empty suit. He’s an empty suit who thinks he’s gods gift to Melrose. Heard he’s prone to temper tantrums and has trouble telling the truth.
I have heard he has other problems as well. I wouldn't be surprised if there was a certain popular hashtag reckoning in his future